The Devil and the Swan
by Larraine Lynch
Summary: After Nina Andrea Sachs survives that almost fatal ballet performance, she leaves the ballet world. Instead of dancing, she locates a job as Miranda Priestly's second assistant. Not long after, Runway begins a ballet spread. Mirandy


This is a story I've had spinning around in my head for a while. It's a Black Swan/Devil Wears Prada fanfic. FYI, I've taken some liberty with the Black Swan plot and characters.

Andrea Sachs is Nina from Black Swan. At the end of the Black Swan movie, Andy survives and ultimately gets a job at Runway under a falsified name. When Andy finally gets her feet under her at Runway, Miranda begins a Ballet spread for the next issue of the magazine.

Read. Enjoy. Review if you want. And I hope to catch you again next time I update.

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><p>"That's all." Andrea Sachs heard the words in her dreams. The words reverberated through disconnected images of swans flying and ballerina's dancing until all that was left was death. Andrea completed move after move. She was the Swan Queen conquering the stage for the last time.<p>

She could feel the blood seeping from her stomach. She danced until all she knew was pain, anger and the silken caress of a cool dismissal. The black swan conquered. It seduced. Elegance and passion personified. And by the end of the dream those dark passions pushed her over a ledge. The dark swan did not falter. It hurtled over the edge.

Andrea woke. She curled into a ball. Her breath gasped out through chapped lips. Her head burrowed under the pillow. Her fingers clutched at her still healing stomach. She could feel the jagged stitches that had saved her life through her baggy grey shirt. Her finger itched to tear and pick at the delicate pieces of thread that kept her rooted to life.

Instead she allowed her fingers to score across the skin of her upper right arm. The motion burned. Andy knew she needed to stop soon. They would be gouges in the morning if she continued. You don't need the socks, she told herself. Just stop. Remembering the restricting socks over her hands, Andy shuddered.

Five minutes later Andrea had managed to force her hands between her thighs. Just, Andy told herself, just lay there. You can just lay there. No black swan or white swan or mamma to make things worse. Only the moon drifting through the miniscule square window, the feel of her bare cotton pillow against her cheek, her lumpy mattress, and the pain in her upper right arm. Andrea did not sleep that night, nor did she rise.

Instead she shook as images of her killing her understudy came to her over and over again. Images of her mother yelling at her and berating her. Thomas Leroy, her director, grabbing her in a bruising brushing of lips, and the taste of blood in her mouth when she bite him. And finally the white haired woman stepping elegantly out of her car and saying coolly "that's all."

Andy remembered watching the woman while clutching a brown briefcase she had found at a second hand store. That and the worn suit were the last of her funds. The last of what her mommy had left her after cleaning out her bank account. She needed the assistant job that she had been called in for. Andrea was frozen in place. All she could manage was to call Runway to report that she was sick. Come back tomorrow a snippy voice had told her or don't come at all. Andrea Sachs fled as fast as her fast as her injured stomach would allow.

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><p><strong>Pre-Moving Out<strong>

Andrea's mother stood in the obsessively clean apartment. "Leave then," Erica Sachs had said, her lifeless brown hair pulled up into a styleless ponytail. Her lips pulled into a pinched line. She took an aggressive step forward. Andy shrunk into herself. "Leave," Erica hissed.

Andy had clutched her suitcase. She hunched with her right arm crossed over her stomach protectively. She swallowed and licked her lips. She winced as her arm brushed against her wound through the blue wool.

Erica watched the reaction with cold eyes. She wore expensive designer clothes. Andy did not know the designers or labels. When Andy was younger, she used to buy Andrea similar types of clothes. That had ended when Andy failed to perform adequately at ballet. Bleeding feet was not a good excuse to perform like an amateur. Sachs woman are not mediocre, Erica had hissed. And until Andrea learned to embrace the Sachs name, she would not dress to meet her station.

"Find some rundown apartment. See how you survive without me."

For a moment Andrea's mind clashed. What if she couldn't do this? When had she ever been alone? She had always lived with her mother. Always had her mother to push her in her art. To cover all of the finances and bank information while Andrea plied and pirouetted. Andy didn't even know how to access her bank account. She knew where bank was, but she did not have a check book or a card. Her mother had always given her the money that she might require while not perfecting her craft.

"And if you think that I'll leave all of my hard earned money for you to spend on drugs, you're crazy." Andrea's mother grabbed her arm. She tightened her grip until Andy felt the finger nails puncture her skin.

Andy wrenched her arm out of her mother's grip. She stumbled. She braced her hand against the wood floor. Her stitched pulled. Andrea breath hitched. Her body shook. Then she forced herself to stand. She reminded herself of all the times her therapists reminded her that it was okay to leave the nest. Healthy even to become independent and search for her own dreams. It terrified Andy, but she would do it.

"I'm 25." Andy's words came out weak. More like a beaten white swan than a fierce black one. Andy fought the urge to scratch at her wrist. She clutched at the baggy jeans instead.

Erica laughed. The harsh sounds made Andy feel like a naughty toddler. "Adults know their bank passwords; they pay rent; they file their own taxes." Erica slapped her hand against her jean encased thigh. "You. You're nothing without me."

The black swan inside Andy began to rise. She felt its anger thrum through her veins. Andy paid for everything, her mommy didn't even have a job. The woman had quit her job when Andy turned fifteen and got her first job at a ballet company. She had told the younger Andy, that it was her turn now. Erica had taken care of Andy, raised her, paid for her ballet lessons, she deserved to relax.

Andy had meekly nodded too nervous about her new position at the ballet company to protest. The memory caused her heart beat out a sharp rhythm. Her mommy continued to talk. Then to yell. Then she was clutching at Andy's arm again.

"Stop." In Andy's mind the word were accompanied by a well-aimed fist. It hit her mother and then she continued to punch. And punch. And punch. Until blood coated her hands, splattered across her too pale face, and slithered across the hard wood floor. Then Andy stood surrounded by the expensive brocade furnishings and elegant paintings. The black swan hissed in triumph. The white swan recoiled.

"Nina Andrea Sachs," her mother's lips pulled into a tight line. Andrea shivered. She shuddered at the realization that she had just experienced another hallucination. Her mother peered at her through narrowed eyes. Brown disapproving eyes framed in heavy black eyeliner. "Are you high again?"

Andrea shook her head. Her brown hair brushed her hallow cheeks. She shuddered as she remembered all of the very vivid hallucinations caused by the ecstasy thrumming through her veins. Sex with Lilly. Killing Lily. Lily and Thomas having sex. Killing Lily again. Stabbing herself with a jagged shard of a mirror. Andrea's hands shook. Her stomach flexed at the feeling of pain as the shard pierced her. Never again.

"You're using again?" Her mother shrieked. She placed a hand on her own cheek. Erica's skin was wrinkled and worn. To Andy, her mother had always been this worn down and slowly decaying person. Even when Andy was young. Her mother had never been beautiful.

Andy shook her head. "I'm not. Believe it or not."

"I don't." Erica said. She took a deep breathe through her nose. She covered her face with a carefully manicured hand. After a few moments, she lowered her hand. "I'm going to talk to Thomas about this."

Andy flinched at the mention of the dark haired dance director. At the memory of the man shoving her towards the abyss. At his overly sexualized touches. His continual refrain about all of her defects. If she returned to finish the season, it would kill her.

Andrea did not want to die. She wanted to heal. Learn how to trust herself again. And find other activities besides dance that she could embrace. Maybe find other people besides her mommy, Lily, Thomas, and her therapist. Andrea's throat seemed to close. She forced herself to open her mouth to speak. "I'm not going back."

Erica scrolled through the contacts on her phone. When Andy's words finally sunk in, Erica's head snapped up. "No." Erica shook her head, her ponytail waved like an angry snake. Both the white and black swan inside Andrea tensed at the motion. "Not after everything we've worked for."

"My therapist—" Andy started.

Erica made a sound of disgust in the back of her throat. "Don't you see? He's taking you from me." Erica clenched her hands into fists. She put herself between Andy and the door. "He's stealing your dreams."

Andy merely shook her head. "I'm really sorry mommy." Then she walked over to her suitcase. She grabbed the handle and rolled it to the door. Erica Sachs gave a little shriek. Andy heard a thump and then the shattering of glass. Andy did not stop to look.

As Andy grasped the bronze handle, she tensed. She half-expected her mommy to grab her before she could leave. To lock her in her room before calling Thomas. They would stand together talking about all of Andrea's defects as she huddled on her pink comforter with her lacey pillow clutched against her stomach.

Erica Sachs did not stop her daughter. Andrea Sachs walked out of the apartment. Tears did not come as she rolled her pink suitcase across the beige carpet.

She pushed the button for elevator and watched as the light worked through the numbers. With a soft beep and the grind of metal on metal, the elevator offered sanctuary. Andrea hurried on. The suitcase caught momentarily in the grooves of the elevator entrance.

The black swan in Andy hissed in annoyance. The white swan waved its wings in panic at the extra time. Her mother could still claim her. At the thought Andrea felt adrenaline shoot though her body. Finally she got the luggage in the elevator. She watched the space were her mother's apartment was with wary brown eyes.

The elevator door closed. Andrea Sachs rested her weight on the cool metal of the elevator. She let her head fall back against the elevator. The motion was sharp. It caused a bang and a slight fission of pain.

Pain, Andy was familiar with, how many times had she pushed through cramped muscles, blistered and bleeding feet, and hard falls to the floor? Andy could not count.

The doors opened three times to let on passengers. One time it went back up one floor. The entire time Andy's heart thudded in her chest. And with each stop, her body grew tenser. Surely Thomas wouldn't get here in time to intervene? To demand she finish the second half of the season.

Andy was shaking by the time the elevator reached the bottom floor. She waited til' the other passengers filed off. Then she gripped her suitcase in a strangle hold, and headed towards the entrance. The elderly doorman hurried to open the door. "Miss Sachs," he said. He tilted his head in greeting. "Have a good night."

Andrea managed to force a smile. She forced her head to nod back. She walked to the waiting taxi. She opened the door and relaxed. Dr. Jameson nodded at her. He was an older man who was more grey than blonde. His form was on the heavier set side. Not a threat. Andy relaxed. Dr. Jameson, her therapist, would know where she could go to start.

He knew someone who would lease an apartment to her at a cheap rate until she managed to locate a job. And she had to, he had told her in her last therapy session. What he was doing could very quickly veer into the inappropriate. He would help her, help herself. He could not become another keeper who watched, cared for, and monitored her.

Andrea Sachs felt hope for the first time in years.


End file.
